A macaque named Bradley in South Carolina had what seemed to be a happy finish, but it turned out to be very sad. When Bradley the monkey was found on Monday, he was already dead.
“I can confirm that the monkey was not captured alive,” Megan Utsey, who is the deputy county administrator for Colleton County, told WCSC-TV on Wednesday.
One of the people who shot Bradley said that the ape was threatening their dog, Utsey said. The Colleton County Sheriff’s Office told WCBD-TV that the story was true after talking to the owner of the 15-year-old monkey.
In an email to WLTX-TV, Utsey said that county officials helped the owner look for Bradley at first.
“However, no Colleton County staff or resources were used in this case,” she wrote. “All the information we have about what happened comes from what the owner told us.”
Colleton County Animal Services said in a statement that Bradley got out of his Walterboro home on May 23 after living there for six years. At first, the owner thought he could catch the monkey himself, but he wasn’t successful.
Authorities said it was harder to catch him because of how widely the story of his escape spread and because people in Walterboro saw him.
WCBD reported that Colleton cat Control said they got the information they needed from Bradley’s owner when they said the cat had been found.
The agency said in a Facebook post on Monday, “According to Bradley’s owner, attempts to capture him were successful.” In their post, animal control officers didn’t say for sure if the animal was still living or had died.
WLTX reports that even though Bradley wasn’t seen as scary or mean, officials were still worried because the animal was wild.
Bradley had lived in Walterboro for six years.